This invention relates to the field of emergency room medicine, including the care of a patient during surgery, as well as during intensive care. The invention comprises a novel assembly of intravascular tubes which facilitates the rapid and safe injection of intravascular fluids into a patient. By "intravascular" it is meant that the injections described herein may be either intravenous or intra-arterial. That is, the present invention can be used to inject fluids into both veins and arteries.
For example, when a patient is admitted to a hospital for emergency surgery, it is usually necessary to administer multiple intravascular fluids, including various drugs or blood. Also it may be necessary to sample the patient's blood, and to measure the patient's blood pressure at different points. Because of adverse drug interactions, it is necessary to prevent the various drugs and fluids from being mixed before entering the bloodstream. Also, there is usually a need to administer multiple intravenous infusions rapidly. Thus, it is common to employ a plurality of separate tubes for each substance being administered to, or withdrawn from, the patient.
In an emergency room, operating room, or intensive care unit, this multiplicity of tubes can be hazardous.The correct medication must be administered promptly at the correct site. But the greater the number of tubes, the greater the likelihood that the tubes will become tangled. Entanglement of the tubes, at worst, can cause fatal errors in administering drugs and fluids. At best, such entanglement slows the operation, due to the extra time required to guard against error by tracing the path of each tube. Although the time required to trace the path of a tube may not seem long in absolute terms, even a short delay in administering a necessary fluid can be too long during emergency surgery. During such surgery, there is little or no time to think, especially when the life of the patient is threatened, and when so many drugs need to be given quickly and during a short period of time.
Even after the operation is concluded, it is necessary to keep the various intravascular tubes separated and organized. After a typical operation, the patient is often left with an entanglement of intravascular tubes placed on or near the chest. In order to facilitate transport of the patient following the operation, it is important that such tubes not become tangled at sites near the body. Then, after transport to the intensive care unit or the recovery room, there begins the usually frustrating task of untangling and separating the tubes while, hopefully, not dislodging them in the process. Not only is this scenario time-consuming, but it is actually dangerous, especially if the patient requires intravenous medication immediately after transport.
There are many examples of intravascular tube assemblies in the prior art. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,316,935 a plurality of flexible tubes for use in administering fluids to a patient. Another example of an assembly of tubes for similar purposes is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,954,028. U.S. Pat. No. 4,308,642 gives an example of a structure for supporting an intravascular tube alongside a hospital bed.
The prior art discloses the use of intravascular tube assemblies, and some, such as the first two patents cited above, disclose types of separator means for holding the tubes in spaced relation. The present invention, however, provides a safe and inexpensive means to prevent entanglement of the intravascular tubes, as well as as a means for identifying the tubes rapidly and reliably when time is of the essence. This invention is particularly suited not only to situations where one needs to administer many fluids to a patient, but also to cases where one does not know, beforehand, how long the patient will need each such fluid.